Belarusian cardiac surgery should reach the level of 7,000 operations per year - expert

December 17, Vitebsk /Sergey Kochetov - BELTA/. Belarusian cardiac surgery has the potential to perform up to 7,000 heart operations per year. This was announced today to journalists by the Head of the Cardiac Surgery Laboratory of the RSPC "Cardiology", Chief Freelance Cardiac Surgeon of the Ministry of Health of Belarus, Doctor of Medical Sciences, Professor Yuri Ostrovsky. He is taking part in the first republican scientific-practical conference of cardiac surgeons and thoracic surgeons in Vitebsk, reports a BELTA correspondent.

Over the past two years, a tremendous amount of work has been done in Belarus to develop the cardiac surgery service, in particular, cardiac surgery departments have been established in all regional hospitals. In 2009, about 500 heart operations were performed, but this is only the beginning, believes Yuri Ostrovsky. "In the future, we should reach the level of up to 7,000 operations per year, which will allow us to reduce the patient waiting list to a minimum - up to three months," he believes. Today, the waiting list ranges from six months to a year, depending on the region.

The increase in the number of operations allows for an improvement in the accessibility of cardiac surgery care for the population. Domestic specialists are able to provide such care in all regions of the country, and this is the greatest achievement in the development of cardiac surgery in recent years, emphasized Yuri Ostrovsky. In addition, in 2009, 11 heart transplant operations were performed in Belarus. This gives us the right to say that all types of cardiological care, including high-tech care, are performed in the republic, which brings the country to the level of European countries in this area of medicine, the scientist noted.-0-